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Updated: June 16, 2025
I struck north, as Inyati had told me, due north; in spite of the fact that in that direction the dunes were of the worst; and for a day, and half a night, I wayfared, striving in sheer physical suffering to drown the sorrow of losing Inyati.
The air was hot and stifling, and there was none of the pleasant coolness usual to even these summer nights in the desert, and on climbing to the crest of the dune to look vainly towards where Inyati must be wandering, I saw that the sky in that direction was heavy with clouds; and even as I looked, flash after flash of lightning rent their heavy pall.
I must have stumbled and fallen, drugged with the insidious poison of the faint perfume, for I came to myself lying upon the ground among the flowers, and with Inyati shaking me violently and shouting in my ear. I was drunk with sleep, and it was with the utmost difficulty that he induced me to mount the only horse still capable of carrying me.
Buck was plentiful, and for a day or two we ate, drank, and slept to our heart's content, gathering all the strength we could for our next attempt. Inyati was full of confidence for the future, confident that we should never have difficulties to encounter equal to those we had surmounted, and that the diamonds and wives would soon be at our disposal.
However, I could not remain where I was and die without a struggle; so, dividing the load as well as possible among the almost exhausted animals, I again entered the maze of dunes and struck due east, full of forebodings as to my own possible fate, and of sorrow for that of poor Inyati.
Yes; and I had seen no fire except of my own kindling since the night that Inyati had died . . . months months surely it must have been years ago? . . . Here at last must be human beings: savages maybe, but still flesh and blood like myself; and if they were in the crater there must be a way down.
For God knows how long I had seen no human being no living creature indeed but a few birds and I had almost forgotten the sound of a human voice. Sunk in apathy I had become almost as a beast, but the sight of the diamonds had aroused me, and I recalled how poor Inyati had called them "magic stones." Magic indeed, for they had saved my reason.
"No magic, Inyati," said I, "but in my country, across the great water, these things are worth many muskets, cattle aye, and even wives!" "That may be, my master," he replied, "but magic they are; and hide themselves when dogs such as these Bushmen search for them.
"Dogs they may be, Inyati," I answered him, "but they are dogs with keen eyes; and yet they cannot find the stones I seek, and that I know, too, are not far away!"
One day, when the Bushmen had again trooped off on their fruitless search, I called Inyati; and told him to make certain preparations, as, should they again bring in nothing, I would strike camp and return to Walfisch Bay. And then I asked him, out of curiosity, why he had not tried to earn the gun.
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